Quaker Instant Oatmeal Hot Stuff Game

I was usually a cold cereal eater, even in the winter, but when a good contest was involved, I could be swayed to eat just about anything. So in the mid 1980s when Quaker ran their “Hot Stuff” sweepstakes, with its promise of electronic prizes, how could I resist?

What was really cool about the contest is that each envelope of Oatmeal was a chance to win. So every morning I would carefully tear open the envelope to see if I won. You would think that the sweet oatmeal would be a nice consolation prize when you lost, but to me it just started to taste like failure.